By Breaking Belize News Staff (HP): An independent scientist has added weight to what officials already suspect. The massive die-off in the Belize River, which killed fish along with hicatee turtles and crocodiles, was almost certainly caused by something that entered the water, not anything natural to the river itself.
Dr. Donald McKnight, research director at the Savannah Field Station in La Democracia, conducted his own fact-finding tour and shared his findings via Zoom. His reasoning starts with the victims. “Turtles and crocodiles can breathe air, so a lack of oxygen wouldn’t kill them,” he explained. Necropsies on the hicatee, a critically endangered species, told the rest. “Its liver looked like it had failed, it was very yellow and showed signs of toxicity.”
McKnight also ruled out a natural algae bloom in the channel. The Belize River flows too fast for that, he said. His suspicion runs instead to a bloom in a retention pond somewhere that then emptied into the river, and he noted the two theories aren’t rivals. An organic load can trigger a bloom, and the bloom releases toxic chemicals. “Either way, it seems it was something that entered the system, which I think is the really key point.”
His assessment lines up with Chief Environmental Officer Anthony Mai, who said this week the cause was not a disease but likely an organic load or toxins, with speculation pointing to agricultural operations in the area, including an apparently illegal rice farm.
McKnight visited that rice farm at Laboring Creek and didn’t like what he saw. “For sure what’s happening, it’s a problem that it’s cleared right up to the edge of the river.” He also examined a canal he believes comes off a nearby agricultural property, one that residents from the Baboon Sanctuary found running at a high flow rate days earlier. When he arrived, he found fish skeletons along it and a dead tilapia in the water. “Maybe that’s the source,” he said, “but we’re trying to piece things together after the fact.”
To be clear, no source has been established, McKnight himself says it’s not yet clear where the contamination originated, and no response from any operation in the area appears in the report. The investigation continues, and it carries extra urgency for one reason the public knows well: this is the same river that feeds the Double Run water treatment plant.
The post Fish, turtles and crocodiles died, scientist says something entered the river appeared first on Belize News and Opinion on www.breakingbelizenews.com.
By Breaking Belize News Staff (HP): An independent scientist has added weight to what officials already suspect. The massive die-off in the Belize River, which killed fish along with hicatee turtles and crocodiles, was almost certainly caused by something that entered the water, not anything natural to the river itself. Dr. Donald McKnight, research director
The post Fish, turtles and crocodiles died, scientist says something entered the river appeared first on Belize News and Opinion on www.breakingbelizenews.com.
